Zuzka recalled the moment she came out as a lesbian to her father.

“It cleared the air and in some ways improved our relationship,” said the 27-year-old from the eastern Slovak city of Kosice near the border with Hungary. “Shocked as he was, he said he’ll never stop loving me. But he’s been taught so many dogmas — and told they’re immutable — that they stuck inside him like a stone,” Zuzka told BIRN. “There are things that he cannot recognise exist.”

Zuzka’s father is a priest within the Greek Catholic church, the third largest religious denomination in Slovakia, where some 66 per cent of people identify as Catholics. Raised in a house full of icons, old books and religious symbols, Zuzka says she has never turned away from God or her Catholic faith, despite the Church’s disdain for homosexuality.

“I owe who I am largely to the church. I saw so many good things there. But I don’t feel accepted. Otherwise, I wouldn’t hide my orientation for 25 years.” She spoke on condition of anonymity, saying she did not wish to harm her father’s career. Zuzka is not her real name.

Despite some signs of change, Slovakia trails its European Union peers in terms of gay rights, and generally conservative Slovak society is still suspicious of the LGBT community. Catholicism, like many other religions, has struggled with the issue of homosexuality, with strict interpretations of the Bible often used to condemn homosexuality as a sin. Mainstream political parties in Slovakia, meanwhile, have long tried to stick close to the Church given its influence among voters. Read more via Balkan Insight